


hypothesis

by stag_von_simp



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Blood?, Dimitri Kind of Implies He Has Feelings For Claude, Dimitri's POV, Having Crises, It's Briefly There If That's A Trigger, It's Just Two Dudes, M/M, Oneshot, Overthinking, Pre-Timeskip | Academy Phase (Fire Emblem: Three Houses), Should I Tag For Blood?, Somewhat Panicked Thoughts, Talking, There is no plot, Third Person Limited, but other than that, excessive descriptions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-26
Updated: 2019-12-26
Packaged: 2021-02-25 21:27:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21972070
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stag_von_simp/pseuds/stag_von_simp
Summary: claude has a hypothesis about dimitri.  there's only one way to prove himself correct: asking dimitri, analyzing every quirk of his expression, and knowing that there's no way such a lofty question could be answered with the simple truth.
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd & Claude von Riegan, Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/Claude von Riegan (somewhat implied)
Comments: 7
Kudos: 51





	hypothesis

“You know,” Claude starts, voice a song, a  _ lilt,  _ even offensively casual, “I have a hypothesis about you.”

Dimitri braces his folded arms against his chest. “Let’s hear it,” he decides before he can stem the declaration with a sharp nip of his tongue.

“Okay. You might not like hearing it, and you don’t have to respond at all.” A breeze of sheepishness hops across Claude’s expression--his cheeks flash, his teeth rake across the cloud of his bottom lip. His gaze slopes to the floor. “Just don’t get really mad, alright?”

“Me? Angry? Over a theory?” The chuckle he huffs is only half-forced. It twists an ache into his throat--a twin for the throb in his head, he supposes. “I’ll be mature. You have my word.”

Claude feathers a laugh of his own; it’s far more convincing than Dimitri’s own. The Leicester heir really does have a flair for deception. Dimitri most certainly doesn’t. “Whatever you say, Princey,” Claude snorts. “Well, here it is: I think you’re trying to prevent your own happiness, for some reason.”

Dimitri’s eyes spike with surprise, dangling on the fringe of their sockets until he can blink down his mask of composure. “That’s...preposterous. Perhaps it’s the most foolish thing you’ve said, in all the time I’ve known you, Claude. And if I’m allowed to say so, you have said quite a few foolish things. This is an outlier even among those, I’m afraid.”

“I don’t know,” Claude tuts, a smirk clearly teasing his lips. “I think I’m right.”

“Of course you’re not,” Dimitri rebukes, a defensiveness he’d tried so hard to drink from his voice slick in every rock-hard syllable. “That’s crazy. Did I not make that clear?”

“No, you did. Perhaps  _ too  _ clear, I’d wager. If it weren’t true, you would have laughed in my face, right? You wouldn’t be so red in the face.”

Dimitri arms unfurl, and he scrubs his fingers down his flaming cheeks, as if he can erase the color from his face so simply. Even the tips of his ears are aflame. “You’re...wrong, Claude. You’re somehow even more unhinged than I thought.”

The laugh that erupts from Claude is a quick burst, and not one of mirth, either. It’s cut from his throat and his nose in equal measure--a snip with a trembling hand, a jagged, violent tear. A shadow swabs across Claude’s expression, obscuring the sunny lie just long enough for Dimitri to see his frustration.

“Unhinged?” Claude practically spits. “I’m the unhinged one? Well, maybe so, but you’ve gotta keep in mind that you’re the one literally  _ dodging happiness _ before you start tossing accusations.”

“I told you.  _ You’re incorrect _ . Perhaps you should watch your accusations, too.”

Claude’s silence is retort enough. Dimitri’s stomach is flailing, a rebel in chains.

“That doesn’t even make  _ sense _ ,” he forges on, but he feels like he’s trying to hack through a tower of vines, his tongue but a flimsy wooden blade. Claude’s features refuse to so much as scuttle towards another discernable emotion. Dimitri is growing angry himself; his chest is simmering, as if  _ something _ stews within it. He can feel the bubbles of any dignity he had popping.

_ Pop, pop. _

_ B r e a t h e. _

He obeys, gulping down a scorching breath. “Why would anybody do that to themselves? Please, Claude, enlighten me. Your logic is barely logic at all.”

“Well, it’s obvious every smile’s a fake. You’re like a man at a masquerade.” Claude’s eyes lull back, rolling. “You think you’re hiding well, but you’re not. And then...gah, nothing. I just...notice things about you. Things that kind of make my ears perk.”

“Like what?”

“Like how you talk about yourself,” Claude says. “More like how you don’t. Someone asks you a question, you go,  _ haha, sure, now let’s talk about you.  _ Not very princey.”

“I don’t need to be Ferdinand von Aegir to be a prince,” Dimitri points out.

“Ferdinand von Aegir does the same thing as you, but that’s beside the point. We all know that guy is the most insecure person on the planet. But I don’t think you hide the same way as he does. He’s afraid of blundering in the spotlight, but you...Dimitri, I kind of think you’re convinced you don’t deserve the spotlight at all.”

Dimitri has no response to that. He gnaws his lip, teeth digging into the muscle until blood jumps from a gash he carves, here and now. Any word he could say is drowned in the surge of salt.

“That’s what I thought _. _ ” There’s a boast in Claude’s voice, capping his words with glittering pride. The easy smile leaks back onto his face simply. The furrow springs from his brow, and Dimitri’s stomach slumps with relief at the mere sight of it. “You can’t argue with the truth, can you?”

Dimitri sighs into his mouth.

“Funny. I am  _ so smart _ ,” Claude gloats on. Dimitri’s meager courage wilts; his eyes sag to his companion’s suddenly-captivating boots. “Look, Dimitri. It’s a weird theory, I know, especially since you’re such a mellow guy. But if I’m right--and this pretty much sells it for me--I want you to know that you deserve that spotlight as much as anyone else. Maybe even more than anyone else. And I think you’re being unfair. If you don’t think you deserve to be happy--”

Dimitri pins him with a glare--and the glare’s all he can offer, when his mind churns like this.

Claude carries on, as only Claude can. The glare doesn’t seem to have spooked him as much as Dimitri had wished it would. “--You do. Okay? Everyone deserves to be happy.”

“Okay,” but his voice is a choke. “Okay, Claude. You can believe whatever you want to about me. I’m not saying you’re correct, but...the sentiment you express is lovely. There are certain people who need to hear it far more than I do, though.”

He thinks of Dedue--tender, calloused hands, hushed voice--and the Blue Lions, in all their numbers. He thinks of Byleth, and then he doesn’t. His thoughts scamper after another face.

Soft sky blue streams through his consciousness; soft words chime in his ears. Sad eyes, their glow muffled by grief. Knobby fingers, malnourished bones.  _ I’m a monster,  _ except she really, really isn’t.

Scowling mouth, forehead shot with rumpled rage, syllables prickled with acid.  _ Boar. Filthy boar prince, covered in blood.  _ Eyes foggy, tangled with dripping red exhaustion. Sleepless nights tucked away in the bags under his glare.  _ You were my best friend _ . Tears in Dimitri’s eyes.

_ Everyone deserves to be happy. _

White on white, snowbank stacked atop another snowbank, that blinding, that  _ dazzling _ . All of it thrown atop smooth ice, playful annoyance because he can’t dance and he’s tripping, he’s stumbling. The sharpest eyes he’s ever seen, blown amethyst, studded with sunlight recycled by the snow. The most beautiful person he’ll ever know.

_ Everyone deserves to be happy. _

Marianne, Felix.

Edelgard.

But not Dimitri. Never Dimitri.

“Well, talk to you later, Princey. Maybe when you’re not zoning out.” Then Claude swerves down the hallway, trotting, as if the conversation never happened.

But Dimitri’s staked in his place, lifeless as a tombstone and any name that shines on its surface. The complexion strains from his face Fear sips him hollow of anything but itself.

Because Claude’s right. Dimitri really  _ does  _ refuse to be happy.

He doesn’t know what to do with this information, so he relents to the wobble in his knees, sliding to crouch against the wall, clawing his fingers through his hair, letting his mind battle out all the chaos it feels. There’s no use in fighting it.

There’s no use in fighting _ ,  _ period.

Dimitri lunges back to his feet, despite the protest in his skidding feet and chattering knees. He needs Dedue--Marianne--Edelgard  _ desperately.  _ But he could never bother them.

He would be far too happy to see them if he did.

Dimitri drags himself to the training grounds, clamps down on a training lance, and stabs at targets and air, accomplishing nothing. The skin of his palms is chewed open; blood froths down his hands, laces his fingers, dyes crimson rust onto the lance, but _Dimitri_ _doesn’t care._

He refuses to care. That would be too close to tending to himself. Which would be far too close to being happy.

That damned Claude von Riegan. Dimitri curses him, whips himself from the inside for letting the man worm into his core yet  _ again _ . 

But that’s just Claude’s effect, he supposes.

What would be the use in combating it?


End file.
